Richard Austin Freeman, (born 1862, London—died Sept. 30, 1943, Gravesend, Kent, Eng.) popular English author of novels and short stories featuring the fictional character John Thorndyke, a pathologist-detective.

Richard Austin Freeman, c. 1935

W.L. Briant

Educated as a physician and surgeon, Freeman practiced in the Gold Coast (now Ghana), where he caught a fever. Eventually forced by ill health to retire from practice (1904), he began to write fiction. The Red Thumb Mark (1907) was the first of many works featuring Thorndyke.